Fanfiction Archive

Otto Octavius was a man of many qualities. He was an arrogant man. A brilliant man. An idealistic man.

He was also a man of privilege.

His body was of an acceptable color and shape, his social and sexual compulsions were within acceptable standards. He could, by and large, satisfy his personal urges of all types in full accordance with the law, barring the little ways of course, that any normal man will break the small ones now and then.

If on any day, Otto Octavius wanted to call a press conference and say ‘I’m done now, this has all been a horrible mistake’, he would have a dozen of the world’s most influential companies clamoring to defend his good reputation, their lawyers making statements on his behalf, their accountants signing checks. Otto Octavius could retire easily from a life of crime, and have the whole affair laughed off at parties within perhaps six months.

But he’d fought shoulder to shoulder with men and women who were not so lucky.

Men and women who had been driven to the fringes of society for reasons deeper than temporary brain damage and a stubborn refusal to back down.

Men and women whom society could not and would not accept into their good graces due to their physical appearance, or their unwholesome compulsions, or their mental instability. Men and women who had no choice but to lurk in the dark fringes and garner what life and what vengeance they could through criminal activity.

These were people Otto had grown to know. Had laughed with. Had worked beside. Had shared meals and stories and ideas with. They were his fellows, strange bedfellows they may be.

And yet every now and then, he found that he pitied them. Perhaps even found them a bit repulsive. Despite everything.

It would be so easy for him to turn his back on them and their world, and start again. To make that choice that they were barred from.

Would he even feel bad about it? Or just another moment of arrogant pity?